The Pope said something that he himself did not understand meant, but he could be sure that the war was won, and that Archduke Franz was indeed as extraordinary and transcendent as the rumors.

No, it was completely beyond his imagination.

One by one, the airboats rose into the sky, drifted over the ridges, and dropped barrels of horrific bombs on the rebels.

These casks are mixed with nitroglycerin, which is thirty times more powerful than the commonly used black powder. The instability of nitroglycerin becomes an advantage at this point, as it does not require a fuse.

The impact of a fall from a great height is enough to detonate such horrific explosives, but the reality is that some of them are detonated by the continuous effect of gravitational acceleration before they even hit the ground.

Although it did not detonate on the ground as expected, after the Austrian military's tests, the nitroglycerin bomb was more powerful in the air, and the killing radius could be expanded by at least 1.5 times.

Austrian airboats were constantly dropping explosives over the heads of the troops in Labol, and the rebels were overwhelmed by such an unprecedented air strike.

Some people raised their guns and lowered them, wondering if their guns were useless in the face of such a large monster.

The air wave of the bomb that landed directly swept all the people around it into the air, and at the same time, there was also debris and wood chips flying everywhere.

The inconspicuous gravel became a deadly weapon, hitting nearby soldiers with broken bones and tendons, and some unlucky stones directly hit the eyeballs or burst directly through the skull.

"Help! Monsters! ”

"My hands, my hands are gone!"

"I can't see, I can't see anything!"

"Ahh

Wailing, screaming, and explosions were heard one after another, and the gods were very busy on this day, because there were so many people praying.

However, the gods are always more reserved, and they don't let miracles happen just because of these people's begging.

As the commander, Lapol had never seen such a huge monster either, and his performance was no better than that of ordinary soldiers from peasants and burghers.

Labor frantically tried to get under the horse's belly, but the chaos and explosions also startled the horse.

And the new thing of the airship is so scary that the shadow it casts from high school alone evokes instinctive human fear.

Lapol shouted to his cronies, but no one cared about him anymore, and everyone was busy running for their lives.

In desperation, Labol fled to another one, but with a loud bang in his ears, he and the carriage were thrown off.

With intense tinnitus and dizziness, Lapol saw that soldiers were finally starting to raise their guns and fight back.

But before he could laugh, the soldiers petrified. Lapol was furious that Caesar's men were not noble and brave Roman soldiers, but a group of cowardly slaves.

Rabol barely managed to get up, but he was quickly petrified in place. Because on the other side of the mountain, a steady stream of airboats drifted over the hill and attacked the coalition forces.

At the same time, the ground forces of the Austrian Empire were on the move, and the soldiers marched into the valley to the beat of the drums without encountering a single resistance.

In addition to the deterrent power of the monsters in the sky, the skirmishers of the Austrian Empire on the ground also contributed to it.

Because they were fully equipped with new lever-type rifled rifles, they far surpassed the Italian Confederate armies in terms of firepower and accuracy.

The valley pass, which could only spread out a queue of 1,000 people, was dispersed into the valley with only more than 200 stragglers, which greatly reduced the area of the attack.

Moreover, skirmishers can also inflict maximum damage on the enemy in the shortest possible time, which is conducive to the entry of follow-up troops.

The skirmishers are actually just decoys to attract the enemy, and then the rocket units concentrate their fire to cover the enemy troops, and finally the battlefield where the infantry brigades will fight a decisive battle.

The reason why it is necessary to rely on rocket troops, on the one hand, is that the rockets have a fast rate of fire and can deal tons of damage in a short period of time, and on the other hand, it is no problem for soldiers in the mountainous areas of Central Italy to carry rockets on their backs, but it is too difficult to push them over with heavy artillery.

According to the estimates of the Albrecht Front Command, the battle would last three to four hours, and the troops of the Italian Confederate army would collapse.

However, the reality was that the Italian Confederates collapsed the moment they saw the airship, and the skirmishers entered without any resistance.

The infantry brigade in the back was also basically here to hunt rabbits, and the mountains were full of deserters from the coalition army. Franz's order was not to kill indiscriminately, and he didn't care what the devil and angels were.

Franz only knew that these people were valuable laborers, and at the same time could accept lower living security.

It doesn't matter if they're devils or angels, throw them in a factory for a few months and make sure they're all social animals.

To be honest, most of the Austrian military had actually seen airships for the first time, and the shock was indescribable, and the power was so powerful that it felt like a divine punishment.

However, the soldiers of the Austrian army were also glad that such a terrible weapon of war belonged to them.

The Italian Confederations put up only sporadic resistance, and Marshal Laball, who Pius IX called a believer of the devil, was found hiding in a crevice in the mountains.

Labor did not want to surrender and even less to come out, and in the end it was two Austrian soldiers who forcibly pulled him out with a lasso.

The rest of the coalition officers had long since dispersed, but their soldiers didn't want to let them go.

Almost without thinking, the surrendered coalition soldiers pointed out the direction in which the officers had fled, and even said whether the other side had weapons, how many men there were, and what their personalities were.

With the help of this group of qualified prisoners, the post-war processing of the Austrian army was much easier. It's not uncommon for a captive to help capture a captive.

This battle touched Pius IX greatly, especially the "monsters" that could fly in the sky completely broke his previous understanding.

The Pope was beginning to believe the Chief Exorcist, and perhaps the Archduke Franz was really different.

Pius IX had already begun to think about the outrageous deal that Franz had proposed.

The statistics of the war also came out quickly, the Austrian side lost only 37 men, but lost an empty boat.

In fact, the first time this new type of war weapon was put into complex terrain, it was inevitable that there would be problems, and this time it was due to unknown reasons that the airboat lost control and finally crashed into the mountain wall.

However, the tactical effect is surprisingly good, and the explosion of the airship is far more powerful than the bomb. The huge explosion almost triggered a landslide, and the debris directly buried nearly 100 Allied soldiers.

The losses of the Italian Confederations were also smaller than expected, with only more than 3,000 killed, half of whom were trampled to death by their own men in the process of fleeing.

Once a million-strong army, less than 80,000 prisoners were captured at this time.

These people would be simply identified and sent to Austria or overseas colonies, or whether they would pay off their debts and redeem themselves.

(End of chapter)